The Mandel Files, Volume 1

by Peter F. Hamilton

  ‘To get on your back and earn some money?’ Julia asked the image sweetly. She flicked the AV player deck off, and studied the results of JakkiDeath as they floated through her mind. She hadn’t been able to identify all the makes, of course, but approximately one-third of all the clothes Jakki wore on her show were by Esquiline. A lot of them even had the trim little gold intersecting ellipses emblem showing, a lapel pin, or the buttons.

  Product placement. Jakki’s agent had done a deal with Esquiline.

  She pulled a summary of the company from Event Horizon’s commercial intelligence division’s memory core. Esquiline was a relatively new style house, aiming to follow in the footsteps of Gucci, Armani, and Chanel; with shops in every major English city – two in Peterborough – and just starting to expand on to the Continent.

  Julia got Caroline to place a call to Lavinia Mayer, Esquiline’s managing director, for her. My office calling your office was snooty enough to grab attention, and then there was the added weight of her name as well.

  Lavinia Mayer was in her forties, wearing a lime-green jacket over a ruff-collar snow-white blouse. Her blonde hair was cut stylishly short. The office behind her was vaguely reminiscent of art deco, white and blue marble walls, building-block furniture. Impersonal, Julia thought.

  ‘Miss Evans, I’m very honoured to have you call us.’

  Julia decided on the idiot rich girl routine, wishing she had some bubble gum to chew just to complete the picture. ‘Yah, well, I hope this isn’t an inconvenient time.’

  ‘No, not at all.’

  ‘Oh, good, you see one of my friends was wearing this truly super dress the other day, and they said it was one of yours. So I was thinking, you’re a style house, do you by any chance supply whole wardrobes?’

  Lavinia Mayer wasn’t the complete airhead her image suggested, there was no overt eagerness; oversell was always a tactical error. She did become very still, though. ‘We can certainly coordinate a client’s appearance for them, yes.’

  ‘Ah, great. Well I’ll tell you what I want. You’ll probably think it’s really silly, someone in my position, but I’ve been so busy this winter I really haven’t had much chance to plan ahead for spring.’

  ‘That’s perfectly understandable. I watched the roll out of your spaceplane myself. It’s an inspirational machine. The amount of effort you must have put in is awesome.’

  ‘Yah, it is, not that I ever get any thanks. Everyone thinks it’s the designers and engineers who do all the work.’

  ‘How preposterous.’

  ‘Yah, well anyway, the thing is, I’ve got about eighty or ninety engagements coming up in the next four months or so, and I need something to wear for all of them. It would be such a relief to dump the load off on to someone else, preferably a professional. I have so little free time, you see, this way I might just scrabble a little more. It would mean a lot to me.’

  The corners of Lavinia Mayer’s mouth elevated a fraction, the smile a talented undertaker would give a corpse. ‘Eighty or ninety?’

  ‘Yah. Problem?’

  ‘No.’ Her voice was very faint.

  ‘Oh, I’m so glad.’ She pushed a twang of excitement into her voice. ‘Would Esquiline take me on as a client, then?’

  ‘I will attend to you personally, Miss Evans.’

  ‘Oh, please, Julia to my friends.’

  She listened to Lavinia Mayer babble on about organizing a select Esquiline team to cater for her, when would it be convenient for them to call, what sort of engagements, did she have a particular look in mind? After a couple of minutes she palmed her off on to Caroline to finalize details and sat back in the chair, rolling one of the memox AVs in her hands.

  It would be interesting to see just how smart Lavinia Mayer was. The woman would never have clawed her way up to managing director without having some intelligence. An exclusive contract to clothe Julia Evans ought to be a prize worth killing for; the channel exposure time alone would cost millions if it had to be bought, then there were the socialite wannabes who would slavishly follow her.

  If Jakki Coleman hadn’t been dumped or brought to heel inside of two days, Lavinia Mayer was going to have her dream of world domination torn to shreds right under her pointy over-powdered nose. To be rejected publicly – and it would be very public indeed – by Julia Evans would kill their fledgeling reputation stone dead.

  Jakki would probably try and go somewhere else; after all, she couldn’t afford to buy the haute couture her assumed lifestyle required. Julia would follow her, setting up checkmate after checkmate right across the board.

  There was a subdued knock on the study door. Lucas came in. ‘Your guest has arrived, ma’am.’

  A warm buzz invaded her belly. ‘I’ll be right down.’ Yes, this was one day where things were truly going right.

  Robin Harvey’s hands traced an intrigued line down the side of her ribcage before coming to rest lightly on her hips. ‘Try and hold your back straighter as your fingers touch the water,’ he instructed. ‘And stand so that you’re balancing more off your heels.’

  ‘Like this?’ Julia leant back into him. Right out on the threshold of sensitivity she could detect a minute tremor in his fingertips.

  ‘Not quite that much.’ He let go abruptly.

  Julia dived into the water, breaking the surface cleanly.

  Her pool was a large oval affair at the rear of the house, equipped with high boards and a convoluted slide. There was a plentiful supply of colourful beach balls and lilos, a wave machine. The surrounding patio had a bar and barbecue area. It was all designed with fun in mind.

  She surfaced and pushed her hair back. Robin Harvey smiled down at her.

  She had noticed him on Wednesday in the England swimming squad line-up, a strong broad face, wiry blond hair, on edge at the prospect of meeting her. His powerful build, youthfulness – he was eighteen, a year younger than her – and that touch of awkward modesty made for an engaging combination. He was so much more natural than Patrick.

  She had made a point of chatting to him during the training session. His stroke was the butterfly, and he enjoyed diving, though he claimed he wasn’t up to a professional standard.

  ‘Oh, gosh, I’ve always wanted to do that,’ she said guilelessly. ‘It looks so thrilling on the sportscasts, like ballet in the air. I don’t suppose you could teach me some of the easier ones, could you?’ She let a tone of hopefulness creep into her voice at the end. The lonely precious princess not allowed a moment’s enjoyment.

  Turning down such a plaintive request from the team’s sponsor wasn’t a serious option.

  ‘That was very good,’ Robin said as she climbed up the stairs. ‘You’re a fast learner.’

  I was the Berne under-fifteen schools amateur diving champion. ‘That’s because I have such a good teacher.’

  His grin was a genuine one. Julia liked it. She was going to enjoy Robin, she decided. At least with swimmers she had the perfect excuse to get ninety per cent of their clothes off right away. That remaining ten per cent ought to provide her with a great deal of fun.

  She skipped off the top step and breathed in deeply. Robin’s gaze slithered helplessly down to the swell of her breasts under the slippery-wet scarlet fabric of her backless one-piece costume. Bikinis always gave too much away, she thought; the male imagination was such a powerful weapon, you just had to know how to turn it against its owner.

  ‘I’d like to try a back flip,’ she said.

  ‘Uh, sure.’

  After they finished swimming, she showed him round the big conservatory that jutted out from the end of Wilholm’s east wing. The glass annexe had undergone a complete role reversal from its original function. Tinted glass now turned away a lot of the harsh sun’s power, conditioner units whirred constantly, maintaining the air at a cool two degrees celsius. The team contracted to renovate the manor had sunk thermal shields into the earth around the outside, preventing any inward heat seepage. It was a segment cut out of time, i
mmune to the warm years flowing past on the other side of the condensation-lined glass, home to a few rare examples of England’s aboriginal foliage.

  She led him along a flagstone path between two borders. Young deciduous trees grew out of the rich black soil on either side, their highest branches scratching the sloping glass roof. Streaky traces of hoar frost lingered around their roots.

  Both of them were in thick polo neck sweaters, although Julia still felt the cold pinching her fingers. She rubbed her arms, shaping her mouth into an O and blowing steadily. Her breath formed a thin white ribbon in the air.

  Robin stared at it, fascinated. Then he started blowing.

  ‘Polar bear breath,’ she said, and smiled at him. He looked gorgeous with his face all lit up in delight.

  ‘I’ve never seen that before,’ he said.

  ‘You must remember some winters, surely?’

  ‘No. They finished a couple of years before I was born. My parents told me about them, though. How about you?’

  ‘I grew up in Arizona. But I saw some snow when I was at school in Switzerland. We took a bus trip up into the Alps one day.’

  ‘Lumps of ice falling out of the sky.’ He shook his head in bemusement. ‘Weird.’

  ‘It’s not solid, and it’s fun to play in.’

  ‘I’ll take your word for it.’ He tapped one of the trees. ‘What’s this one?’

  ‘A laburnum. It has a lovely yellow flower at the start of summer, they hang in cascades. The seeds are poisonous, though.’

  ‘Why do you keep this place going? It must cost a fortune.’

  ‘I can’t get into fine art; it always seems ridiculous paying so much money for a square metre of turgid canvas. And of course that whole scene is riddled with the most pretentious oafs on the planet. I’ll take my beauty neat, thank you.’ She pointed at a clump of snowdrops which were pushing up around a cherry tree. ‘What artist could ever come close to that?’

  The conservatory always affected her this way, inducing a bout of melancholia. It was the timelessness of the trees, especially the oaks and ash, they were all so much more stately than the current usurpers. They made her cares seem lighter, somehow. She was afraid she might be showing too much of her real self to Robin.

  He was gazing at her again, quite unabashed this time, thick hair almost occluding his eyes. ‘You’re nothing …’ His arms jerked out from his sides, inarticulate bafflement. ‘You’re not what I expected, Julia.’

  ‘What did you expect?’ she teased.

  ‘I dunno. You come over all mechanical on the ’casts, like everything you do is choreographed by experts, every move, every word. Absolute perfection.’

  ‘Whereas in the flesh I’m a sadly blemished disappointment.’

  ‘No!’ He bent down and picked one of the snowdrops. ‘You should get rid of your PR team, let everyone see you as you are, without pretending. Show people how much you care about the small things in life. That’d stop all those critics dead in their tracks.’ He broke off and gave the flower a doleful look. ‘I don’t suppose it’ll happen like that.’

  ‘ ’Fraid not. Nothing is ever that easy.’

  He tucked the snowdrop behind her ear, looking pleased with himself.

  When she kissed him he was eager enough, but he didn’t seem to know what was expected. Her mouth was open to him for a long time before his tongue ventured in.

  She was struck with the thrilling thought that he’d never had a girl before. After all, it took a lot of training and devotion to reach his level of performance, a dedication which cost him every spare minute.

  Her arms stayed round him as he gave her a delighted boyish grin. He had exactly seven days left to court her, then she’d have him. And this time she would be in charge in bed, so it would be a considerable improvement on the way it was with Patrick.

  They rubbed noses Maori-style, then kissed again. This time he wasn’t nearly so reticent.

  The conservatory door was opened with a suspiciously loud rattle.

  ‘Julia?’ Caroline Rothman called.

  Robin disentangled himself, looking extraordinarily guilty as Caroline walked round the end of the border.

  ‘Sorry, Julia,’ Caroline said. ‘Phone call.’

  She wanted to stomp her foot in frustration. ‘Who?’ Whoever, they were already dead.

  ‘Greg. He said it was urgent.’

  She sat down at the head of the study table, and jabbed a forefinger down on the phone button. The call was scrambled, she noticed, coming through the company’s own secure satellite link. Greg and Eleanor materialized on the flatscreen. They were on the settee in their lounge, Eleanor at right angles to Greg, leaning against him, his arm round her. Perfectly content with each other.

  The sight simply deepened Julia’s scowl. She never shared such a homely scene with any of her boys. Not that she wanted to be stuck in all evening being boring, she told herself swiftly.

  ‘This had better be truly astonishingly important,’ she told the two of them loftily. ‘I’m very busy.’

  They looked at each other, pulled a face, and looked back at the camera. ‘Doing what?’

  They were so in tune, she thought despairingly, it wasn’t fair. ‘Financial reviews,’ she said with a straight face.

  ‘Sure,’ Eleanor crooned.

  ‘What did you want?’

  ‘Couple of things,’ Greg said. ‘Firstly, I want my Home Office authority reconfirmed.’

  ‘What? Why?’

  He gave an awkward grimace, which made her take notice. Something which could faze Greg was always going to be interesting.

  ‘There are some aspects of the Kitchener case which I need to review, and what I don’t need is a whole load of flak from Oakham CID right now.’

  ‘What aspects? Nicholas Beswick did it.’

  ‘It would appear so.’

  ‘You saw him. Both of you. You went back in time and saw him!’

  ‘Yeah. Well. Tell you, my intuition is playing up about this.’

  ‘Oh.’ Greg placed a great deal of weight on his intuition. A foresight equal to everyone else’s hindsight, he always said. She wasn’t about to question that. Greg didn’t act on idle whims. But—‘Just a minute, there was the knife as well.’

  ‘Yeah. That’s what makes this all so embarrassing.’

  ‘Julia, we had Beswick’s parents come to see us this morning,’ Eleanor said.

  ‘Oh dear Lord, that must have been awful.’

  ‘No messing,’ Greg said. ‘Look, Julia, just humour me.’

  She listened to him explaining his hunch about an earlier incident at Launde, and MacLennan’s idea that some form of amnesia might be responsible for shielding any guilt in Nicholas Beswick’s mind.

  Julia requested a logic matrix from her nodes, her mind condensing what she was hearing into discrete data packages, loading them in. The matrix parameters were easy to define: assign all the case information to the two suppositions, that Beswick had committed the crime and forgotten it, and that some previous incident was involved. See what fits, what supports either notion.

  ‘If it turns out there isn’t anything to this incident of mine, then it was probably amnesia all along,’ Greg concluded glumly. ‘Which brings us to the second point. I’d like you to run a search program through every national and international news library to see if you can find a reference to Launde Abbey at any time during the last fifteen years.’

  ‘Oh, is that all?’ Which was letting him off lightly, she could just imagine what Grandpa would say.

  ‘Julia Evans, you yanked both of us into this investigation,’ Eleanor said. ‘We only did it for you. Just because it isn’t working out all neat and tidy doesn’t mean you’re allowed to back out. You started it, you damn well see it through to the end.’

  Why was it all suddenly her fault? She wished she’d never heard of bloody Dr Edward Kitchener. ‘I wasn’t backing out,’ she muttered.

  Eleanor nudged Greg. ‘You ought to ask Ranasf
ari if he can remember anything happening at Launde.’

  ‘Good idea,’ he said.

  ‘Cormac was there over twenty years ago,’ Julia said.

  ‘Yeah, but he kept in touch with Kitchener.’

  ‘Not through the PSP decade. He was working on the giga-conductor in our Austrian laboratory. Grandpa didn’t want him mixing with the opposition. He was quite agreeable to the security regimen. You know what he’s like, no personal or private life.’

  ‘Yeah, but I’ll ask him anyway.’

  ‘Sure.’ The matrix run ended. Its results waited for her, not seen, simply present in the null-space which was the axon interface. There was no solution in connection with a possible past incident, insufficient data. But the matrix had thrown up one query, though, an anomaly. ‘Greg, this idea that Beswick murdered Kitchener because he was so enraged about the old man seducing Isabel Spalvas, and then blanked it out later, how does Karl Hildebrandt and the Randon company connection fit in?’

  Greg and Eleanor exchanged another glance, puzzled this time.

  ‘No idea,’ he said.

  ‘We don’t know for certain that Diessenburg Mercantile was involved,’ Eleanor said. ‘It might have been a coincidence.’

  When Greg opened his mouth she laid a finger across his lips. ‘Coincidences do happen occasionally, you know.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he said unhappily.

  ‘No,’ Julia said with conviction. ‘You don’t know Karl like I do. He was anxious to talk with me, all to give me that one piece of advice: take you off the case. It was most deliberate.’

  ‘Does he have any financial or corporate interests outside the Diessenburg Mercantile bank?’ Greg asked.

  ‘No.’ She caught herself and pouted, it had been a reflex answer, she’d been scolded about that enough times by her teachers. ‘That is, I don’t know. He’s never mentioned any.’

  ‘Now I really wish I’d been there,’ Greg said. ‘Can you arrange a meeting, some kind of party?’

  ‘I suppose I could invite some people round for dinner,’ she sighed. ‘But it’s very short notice, he might suspect something, especially if you start quizzing him.’